FIEL: Ateke Tom, the big chief of the Mend, with his boys, in one of the eleven camps he ruled in the mangrove of the Niger Delta on the 9th of February 2009. | Veronique de Viguerie/Getty Images

A first-generation Niger Delta militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, has weighed into the renewed restiveness in the oil-rich region of southern Nigeria.

In a statement, which resurrects its famous spokesman, Jomo Gbomo, MEND criticised the new militant group, the Niger Delta Avengers, waging a campaign against oil production in Nigeria and warned “communities harbouring” members of the Niger Delta Avengers to immediately stop collaborating with the militants.

MEND warned the communities to realise that they are not protected by “the extant principles of international and or municipal law during a conflict” and said that the Avengers attacks on pipelines were “unprovoked”.

The group commended President Muhammadu Buhari, whom it endorsed in the 2015 elections, for taking a first step to cleaning up the devastated Ogoniland and slammed former President Goodluck Jonathan saying even though he is from the Niger Delta, his six years in office did not benefit Ogoni.

“The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) notes with grave concern the recent renewed spate of unprovoked and persistent attacks on Nigeria’s oil installations by the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA),” Gbomo said.

“What are more worrisome to us is the ungodly conspiracy of silence of the region’s elite and their tacit support of the NDA’s conduct under the pretext of a so-called.

“However, we hereby remind our communities, which harbour criminals such as members of the NDA that their communities are not protected by the extant principles of international and/or municipal law during a conflict.”

The MEND Factor

The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, is believed to be a defunct guerrilla militant group and one of the largest of the groups which waged a campaign against oil production in the Niger Delta region that successfully crippled the nation’s economy from 2005 till 2009.

Who are the Niger Delta Avengers

Niger Delta Avengers is a new militancy group that is operating in the oil-rich region of Southern Nigeria.

The militants say they are waging a war for a free Niger Delta Republic in what it tags, Operation Red Economy, with a view of halting crude oil production in Nigeria to force the government to grant the group’s demands.

The militant group has released its rules of engagement and says that it doesn’t kill anybody or attack oil workers or soldiers. The Delta Avengers called on all other groups operating in the region to abide by these rules of engagement. “We need God now, more than ever,” the group said in a statement.